China-taiwan: Over 30 Chinese Warplanes, 9 Navy Vessels Around Taiwan | Asia News

Updated Apr 3, 2024, 08:13 AM IST

Over 30 Chinese Warplanes, 9 Navy Vessels Around Taiwan

The Taiwanthis defense ministry said that over 30 Chinese warplanes and 9 navy vessels have been detected around Taiwan. The ministry made the claim about an hour after the island nation was hit by a magnitude 7.7 earthquake on Wednesday.

The Taiwanese defense ministry posted about the warplanes on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. “30 PLA ​​aircraft and 9 PLAN vessels operating around Taiwan were detected up until 6 am (UTC+8) today. 20 of the aircraft entered Taiwan’s northern, middle line, and SW ADIZ. ROCArmedForces have monitored the situation and employed appropriate force to reply,” it posted.

China is yet to respond to the claim made by Taiwan. Several social media users posted videos of the vessels near Taiwan. We, however, cannot verify the authenticity of the videos.

Earlier in the day, Taiwan tweeted about detecting a PRC satellite launch near its territory. It said the vehicle belonged to the Xichang Satellite Launch Center (XSLC). It did not pose any threat.

“Today, we detected a PRC satellite launch with a carrier vehicle identifying it as belonging to XSLC . Poses no threat to us, the flight path flew towards the West Pacific Ocean. We monitored the vehicle’s activity and are ready to respond if necessary, ” the defense ministry tweeted.

Meanwhile, Chinese President Xi Jinping and US President Joe Biden spoke on a call on Tuesday. According to the White House readout, the two leaders discussed the strained relationship between Washington DC and Beijing. They also spoke about Taiwan and Beijing’s ambitions in the South China Sea.

The White House described the one-hour-45-minute conversation as “candid and constructive”.